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CHAPTER 21

Birth of Isaac.*1The LORD took note of Sarah as he had said he would; the LORD did for her as he had promised.a2Sarah became pregnant and bore Abraham a son in his old age, at the set time that God had stated.b3Abraham gave the name Isaac to this son of his whom Sarah bore him.c4When his son Isaac was eight days old, Abraham circumcised him, as God had commanded.d5Abraham was a hundred years old when his son Isaac was born to him.
6Sarah then said, “God has given me cause to laugh,* and all who hear of it will laugh with me.e7Who would ever have told Abraham,” she added, “that Sarah would nurse children! Yet I have borne him a son in his old age.”
8The child grew and was weaned, and Abraham held a great banquet on the day of the child’s weaning.

9Sarah noticed the son whom Hagar the Egyptian had borne to Abraham playing with her son Isaac;
10so she demanded of Abraham: “Drive out that slave and her son! No son of that slave is going to share the inheritance with my son Isaac!”f11Abraham was greatly distressed because it concerned a son of his.*12But God said to Abraham: Do not be distressed about the boy or about your slave woman. Obey Sarah, no matter what she asks of you; for it is through Isaac that descendants will bear your name.g13As for the son of the slave woman, I will make a nation of him also,* since he too is your offspring.

14Early the next morning Abraham got some bread and a skin of water and gave them to Hagar. Then, placing the child on her back,* he sent her away. As she roamed aimlessly in the wilderness of Beer-sheba,
15the water in the skin was used up. So she put the child down under one of the bushes,
16and then went and sat down opposite him, about a bowshot away; for she said to herself, “I cannot watch the child die.” As she sat opposite him, she wept aloud.
17God heard the boy’s voice, and God’s angel called to Hagar from heaven: “What is the matter, Hagar? Do not fear; God has heard the boy’s voice in this plight of his.h18Get up, lift up the boy and hold him by the hand; for I will make of him a great nation.”
19Then God opened her eyes, and she saw a well of water. She went and filled the skin with water, and then let the boy drink.

20God was with the boy as he grew up. He lived in the wilderness and became an expert bowman.
21He lived in the wilderness of Paran. His mother got a wife for him from the land of Egypt.

The Covenant at Beer-sheba.22* At that time Abimelech, accompanied by Phicol, the commander of his army, said to Abraham: “God is with you in everything you do.
23So now, swear to me by God at this place* that you will not deal falsely with me or with my progeny and posterity, but will act as loyally toward me and the land in which you reside as I have acted toward you.”
24Abraham replied, “I so swear.”

25Abraham, however, reproached Abimelech about a well that Abimelech’s servants had seized by force.
26“I have no idea who did that,” Abimelech replied. “In fact, you never told me about it, nor did I ever hear of it until now.”

27Then Abraham took sheep and cattle and gave them to Abimelech and the two made a covenant.
28Abraham also set apart seven ewe lambs of the flock,
29and Abimelech asked him, “What is the purpose of these seven ewe lambs that you have set apart?”
30Abraham answered, “The seven ewe lambs you shall accept from me that you may be my witness that I dug this well.”
31This is why the place is called Beer-sheba; the two of them took an oath there.
32When they had thus made the covenant in Beer-sheba, Abimelech, along with Phicol, the commander of his army, left to return to the land of the Philistines.*

33Abraham planted a tamarisk at Beer-sheba, and there he invoked by name the LORD, God the Eternal.*34Abraham resided in the land of the Philistines for a long time.

* [21:1–21] The long-awaited birth of Isaac parallels the birth of Ishmael in chap. 16, precipitating a rivalry and expulsion as in that chapter. Though this chapter is unified, the focus of vv. 1–7 is exclusively on Sarah and Isaac, and the focus of vv. 8–21 is exclusively on Hagar and Ishmael. The promise of a son to the barren Sarah and elderly Abraham has been central to the previous chapters and now that promise comes true with the birth of Isaac. The other great promise, that of land, will be resolved, at least in an anticipatory way, in Abraham’s purchase of the cave at Machpelah in chap. 23. The parallel births of the two boys has influenced the Lucan birth narratives of John the Baptist and Jesus (Lk 1–2).

* [21:6] Laugh: for the third time (cf. 17:17 and 18:12) there is laughter, playing on the similarity in Hebrew between the pronunciation of the name Isaac and words associated with laughter.

* [21:11] A son of his: Abraham is the father of both boys, but Sarah is the mother only of Isaac. Abraham is very concerned that Ishmael have a sufficient inheritance.

* [21:13] I will make a nation of him also: Ishmael’s descendants are named in 25:12–18.

* [21:14] Placing the child on her back: a reading based on an emendation of the traditional Hebrew text. In the traditional Hebrew text, Abraham put the bread and the waterskin on Hagar’s back, while her son apparently walked beside her. In this way the traditional Hebrew text harmonizes the data of the Priestly source, in which Ishmael would have been at least fourteen years old when Isaac was born; compare 16:16 with 21:5; cf. 17:25. But in the present Elohist (?) story, Ishmael is obviously a little boy, not much older than Isaac; cf. vv. 15, 18.

* [21:22] Of the two related promises of progeny and land, that of progeny has been fulfilled in the previous chapter. Now the claim on the land begins to be solidified by Abimelech’s recognition of Abraham’s claim on the well at Beer-sheba; it will be furthered by Abraham’s purchase of the cave at Machpelah in chap. 23. Two levels of editing are visible in the story: (1) vv. 22–24, 27, 32, the general covenant with Abimelech; (2) vv. 25–26, 28–30, 31, Abraham’s claim on the well. Both versions play on the root of the Hebrew word sheba‘, which means “seven” and “swear,” and the place name Beer-sheba.

* [21:23] This place: Beer-sheba (v. 31). Abimelech had come from Gerar (20:2), about thirty miles west of Beer-sheba.

* [21:32] Philistines: one of the Sea Peoples, who migrated from Mycenaean Greece around 1200 B.C. and settled on the coastland of Canaan, becoming a principal rival of Israel. Non-biblical texts do not use the term “Philistine” before ca. 1200 B.C.; it is probable that this usage and those in chap. 26 are anachronistic, perhaps applying a later ethnic term for an earlier, less-known one.

* [21:33] God the Eternal: in Hebrew, ’el ‘olam, perhaps the name of the deity of the pre-Israelite sanctuary at Beer-sheba, but used by Abraham as a title of God; cf. Is 40:28.

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